A common problem associated with arc welding is fume production. Because of the high temperatures involved, both the metallic and inorganic ingredients involved in the welding operation can vaporize into the atmosphere. Some of these ingredients such as manganese, chromium, nickel, cadmium and lead, for example, are deleterious to health. As a result, recent environmental regulations limit the amounts of these deleterious elements that can be present in the weld fumes produced by a typical welding operation.
One approach for reducing the amount of these deleterious elements in welding fumes is to reduce the concentration of these deleterious elements in the weld deposits that are ultimately produced. Normally, this is done by reducing the amount of these deleterious elements in the welding wires used to form these weld deposits. See, for example, U.S. 2013/0313240 and U.S. 2014/0083981 to Amata et al., which describe techniques for reducing the amount of manganese in welding fumes by using low-manganese welding wires to form low-manganese weld deposits.
Although such approaches may be effective in reducing the amount of deleterious elements in weld fumes, they are disadvantageous in that the weld deposits they produce are deficient in these very same elements.